Sig P239 Takedown Issue

I have an issue with my Sig P239 in .40 and am curious if anyone else has run into this, maybe it is normal.

When I try to turn the takedown lever downward it take a HUGE amount o force to turn it. The slide is in the correct takedown postion, the lever is just hard to turn. Also, the recoil spring guide is made of plastic and the little flange at the end is being bent/mushed where it mates to the takedown lever. So it woud appear that when you turn the takedown lever it has to slightly move the recoil guide rod forward agains the pressure of the already compressed recoil spring. I don't know if this has anything to do with it or not. Any thoughts or experiences good or bad with yours?

I have an issue with my Sig P239 in .40 and am curious if anyone else has run into this, maybe it is normal.

When I try to turn the takedown lever downward it take a HUGE amount o force to turn it. The slide is in the correct takedown postion, the lever is just hard to turn. Also, the recoil spring guide is made of plastic and the little flange at the end is being bent/mushed where it mates to the takedown lever. So it woud appear that when you turn the takedown lever it has to slightly move the recoil guide rod forward agains the pressure of the already compressed recoil spring. I don't know if this has anything to do with it or not. Any thoughts or experiences good or bad with yours?

Thanks,
Pete

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I, for one, can't account for this. But what I can tell you is this.

My wife has a P239 in 9mm, and it falls to me to clean it, which I am pleased to do. I myself have a P6, which, in terms of field stripping, is no different than the P239.

I've never had the problem of requiring excessive force to rotate the takedown lever "down" in either, and both of our recoil spring guides (P239 and P6) are metal. (Which means that to take down either, all I need to do is lock the slide back, and use a little thumb pressure to rotate the lever to the down [field strip] position).

Did you buy this gun new? I ask because it's hard for me to believe that SIG would use plastic for . . . well . . . any gun part, other than stocks.

Thanks bloc. Yes, I bought it new, actually several years ago, maybe 8 or so. I contacted SIGARMS about the head of the plastic guide rod being bent not long after I purchased it. They were nice enough and sent me a new guide rod (also plastic). At the time I guess I just attributed it to being a new gun and needing a while to loosen up or something. Then I just sort of accepted it being that way and didn't worry too much about it. It just became an annoyance that I could live with. After messing with it the other night though it dawned on me to post a message to see what other folks experiences are with that gun model.

Okay, I've looked a little more closely at what happens when we field strip our two (both P239 and P6). I think your diagnosis is spot on.

We can see that rotating the takedown lever down does push the recoil guide forward against the already-compressed spring (funny, I'd never noticed that before). I have a very easy time believing that if the guide rod were plastic, its head would be easily deformed.

That might explain why our P239, which we bought slightly over a year ago, has a metal guide rod.

Presumably, in the interval between when you bought yours and we ours, SIG found the plastic rod to be a problem and changed to metal.

I think you should give them a call and see what they have to say. Their customer service number is: (603) 772-2302

Thanks again bloc. I appreciate the validation. That would make sense that if they are producing them with metal guide rods now then that might explain my problems with the plastic one. I will give them a call and see what they have to say.